That Joshua strove for this seems, first, to certain of the Jews, [to be] that he might confirm the force and authority of the lots, which he was about to use in the dividing of the promised land. Others (in the Talmud, tractate Sanhedrin, ch. 6; and the book Tanchuma) [think it was] that he might quell the sedition [already] stirred up. For those [rabbis] hold that the tribe of Judah, when it had seen itself branded with sacrilege — with so great a disgrace, by the voice of the lot — took great grief, blazed up in anger, [and] flew forth to arms, as though the iniquitous lot deceived and lied. Joshua therefore led forth the confessing culprit into the midst: and so all was calmed. But the former [reason] could indeed be some cause, yet as it were an assisting one, and perhaps beside all thought of Joshua himself then. The latter seems a Rabbinic fabrication. For [what evidence is there of] a tumult of this kind — what, [is there] anywhere even the least sign [of it]? And had not Joshua most clearly signified that this casting of lots was spoken and appointed by God? How could he have wished to abuse so great a tribe with the empty fiction of a lot, and to appease God, and to bring all that great tribe into that [belief]? Rather, then, it must be said. First: that Joshua aimed at this, that glory be given to God, as was said — by showing [that God is] most knowing of all things, that all things are most open to his eyes, that he is most truthful in what he speaks and shows (whether through himself, or through oracles and lots of whatsoever kind); [that he is] most just, who did not bring the disaster of Ai upon the Israelites without grave cause. Secondly: that he aimed also at the advantage of Achan himself — [so] that, since he had to die, his heart might be touched with true penitence, [and] by a humble confession of the crime he might render God propitious to himself: [and] that he might ascribe to Him glory, in the way handed down in the previous question. Thirdly: that he might call away the minds of all from every crime, and from all hope of hiding some committed crime and bearing it unpunished. Rightly, in the third book On Duties, Cicero [says]: “In every deliberation the hope and opinion of concealing and hiding [wrongs] must be removed. For it ought to be sufficiently persuaded to us (if only we have made any progress in Philosophy), that even if we could hide from all gods and men, yet nothing is to be done avariciously, nothing unjustly, nothing lustfully, nothing incontinently.” And Solon:
Αἰεὶ οὔτε λέληθε διαμπερὲς ὅστις ἀλιτρὸν / Θυμὸν ἔχει· πάντως δ᾽ ἐς τέλος ἐξεφάνη.
[Solon: “Never for long does he escape notice, whoever has a sinning heart; utterly, in the end, he is brought to light.”]
Fourthly: that an example be given to all Judges, before they consign the guilty to death, [showing] in what manner they ought to strive that the guilty confess the crimes for which they are to be punished — whether the truth of them has to be sought out by questionings and tortures, or not. Let there be consulted Gregory of Toulouse (bk. 48, ch. 12). Fifthly and last: that a manner most useful for moving them, and for leading them to all the best [things], be shown to us, [we] who wish some sinners [to be] saved and drawn from the peril of Gehenna. We know that [saying] of St. James (ch. 5, v. 20): “that he who shall have made a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, has saved his soul from death.” Let us say, therefore, to one erring, and holding the depraved ways of crimes — [our] brother, friend, [our] neighbor: “Give glory to God, and confess to him, and show to the priest what thou hast done, [and] hide from him nothing.”